I believe that David Bates was actually born in about 1870, but I have left the date 1873 so no one will create a duplicate FindAGrave memorial. David was listed as 10 years old when the 1880 federal census was taken.

Published in The Albia Union-Republican (May 18, 1944):

David Bates Died at Iowa City Hospital

Ill since last December, David W. Bates, 71, of Albia, Iowa, superintendent of banking in Iowa from 1933 to June 1941, died at University hospital in Iowa City Wednesday.
Following his retirement as banking superintendent, Mr. Bates joined the liquidation division of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation at Washington, D.C.
In addition to serving in the banking post, Bates was a lawyer, having practiced law in Albia for 28 years prior to taking the banking position. He had also served as clerk of the district court and as Monroe county attorney for six years.

Mr. Bates had also been president of the Home Savings bank of Des Moines, president of the Albia State bank, and director of the First Iowa State bank of this community.

Surviving are his wife, Verna, of Albia and a son, Robert, who is in the Navy.

The body was brought to the Humeston funeral home, and services will be held at St. Mary’s church, Saturday morning at 8:30. Father Heinen will be in charge, and burial will be in St. Mary’s cemetery.

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Published in The Monroe County News (May 22, 1944):

Albia Mourns the Passing of Dave Bates, Citizen
[unsigned editorial]

The first time this writer met Dave Bates was back in the years of depression and desolation in 1933 and 1934. The occasion was his personal visit to an Iowa community as superintendent of banking to take over a situation that involved almost utter wreckage so far as the affairs of nine community banks were concerned.

If ever there was a time when the inner heart and soul of a man stood bare, those were the days. Utter financial ruin stalked through our community. The hearts of men and women who had toiled a lifetime were broken, and the fruits of their labor were destroyed. There was no such thing as credit, and certainly no money, and commodity prices were at the bottom.

Dave Bates came on the scene and very quietly began an organization of both debtors and creditors. I recall vividly that Dave Bates said: “Whatever we agree to do, we must do nothing that will add to this common misery. My job is to save everything that can be saved; I promise I will destroy nothing.”

For months and years this great- and stout-hearted man toiled in my old community, and by earnest devotion succeeded in reclaiming much from a situation that in the beginning looked hopeless. And in his reclamation efforts, he worked no hardship on anybody.

Now he has passed on into the hands of the Eternal. He was a fine public servant. He was a sincere gentleman. He was a forward-looking patriot. He was a friend to his fellow man. He was a top-flight citizen.

In the hearts of thousands of Iowans, Dave Bates will live as long as they live and he will be remembered as a man who had a heart . . . as a public official who was tender and considerate in their season of financial heartbreak.